


Rooftop (Above the Clouds)

by alcoholandregret



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 13:43:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13249437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alcoholandregret/pseuds/alcoholandregret
Summary: The only thing worse than prom, he discovers, is watching all of your friends get ready and take pictures, and then scrolling through Instagram to look at all those pictures while they're out having fun. He wouldn't be having fun at prom, and he isn't having fun at home.His only friend that isn't there is consequently the only person he'd wanted to spend time with that night anyway, so really it's a mystery as to why he isn't.





	Rooftop (Above the Clouds)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from [Glowing in the Dark by The Girl and The Dreamcatcher](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_ncIrrM8S0)

The thing about prom is it's pretty fucking stupid, okay? It's dumb, and Mikey hates it, and hates how it's overplayed in every single goddamn teen movie as though it's supposed to be the best moment of the best years of your life. Like, by those standards, that should mean it's the best thing that  _ ever _ happens to you. High school isn't the best years of anyone's life, and prom is just a bunch of sweaty teens dancing to overplayed - and censored - music while their teachers and other school staff members stare at them for hours. The food is shitty and the tickets and suits are expensive and it lasts far too long.

Prom is just really, really dumb, and he hates it, and he still probably would have gone had it not been for that stupid goddamn rule.

The problem actually started during his penultimate year at that prison of a building, when he went to his elective chem lab course and there was a kid sitting next to him that he was pretty sure he'd never seen before - and he knows, like, everyone in that school, okay. That's like, his thing.

His smile was so bright and he was so eager to reach out a hand for Mikey to shake - who even does that in high school - and he was admittedly charmed. Nico.

He's a year younger, so beyond chem lab and lunch, they didn't have any shared classes, but Mikey took it upon himself to kind of adopt him into his friend group, since he was new and everything. No other reason, honest. Mostly it just mattered that Nate like him too, and Nate likes everybody, and Nico is kind of the absolute least terrible person he's met, so it wasn't hard. At all.

They ended up becoming great friends pretty quickly, bonding over hockey when the school's team's season started up. He's also really fucking good at hockey, which, figures. Of course he is. Mikey could bet that there isn’t much Nico  _ isn’t  _ good at.

He went home for the summer, and it was weird. Like, Mikey had Nate and Dylan still, and he's only really ever needed Nate and Dylan, but it still felt wrong, almost, not seeing Nico every day. Or just, in general. Nico said he was considering coming to visit them, because he missed them too, but didn't in the end. The trip was too expensive when he'd just end up coming back in a couple of weeks anyway.

This wasn't the last time he'd get his hopes up over Nico, as it turns out.

It's not, like, a thing, okay, except for the part where it totally fucking is. It's kind of a thing when he and Nate go to pick him up from the airport, it's kind of a thing when his stomach does flips the moment he sees him, and it's most definitely a thing when Nico walks past Nate so he can hug Mikey first.

So, okay, it's a thing, but he has it under control. Totally and completely under control. He only wants to kiss him or hold his hand around forty percent of the time, which is still less than half of the time, so that's a win.

And as the year goes on and that number makes its way up to about eighty percent of the time, part of him knows it's becoming a problem, a real, certifiable Problem, but the rest of him brushes it off because it's still less than a hundred percent. As long as he isn't thinking about it literally all the time, it's just fine. It's great.

Nate calls him out on it when he's drinking over winter break, and Mikey had just been complaining that Nico couldn't come over. That's unfair on pretty much every level, really, and he tells him as much.

It's taken as confirmation despite the lack of actual verbal confirmation. Also unfair.

Mikey changes the topic, choosing to complain about prom instead, settling on the topic easily since ticket fundraisers have started up already. Nate rolls his eyes, but lets it happen. They'd gone to their prom together the year before, and Nate was there to witness firsthand how much Mikey hated it. Dylan still thinks his distaste for the event is hilarious, considering how popular Mikey is and how much he actually genuinely likes spending time around people.

The problem with Drunk Mikey versus Sober Mikey is, while neither of them are known to shut up, Drunk Mikey really does not know when it's time to end sentences. So he takes "and this is Actual Prom" and decides it's a totally valid and good idea to tack on "and I can't ask Nico to be my Actual Date."

Nate takes his drink away, and he doesn't bother protesting.

It really sucks, because he really does want to take Nico to prom. He wants the matching ties and shitty food and the uncomfortable pictures and the slow dancing to whatever love song ends up getting popular at the right time - he wants all of it. The whole nine yards. It's gross, and against like everything he believes in as a person - Nico would probably make prom enjoyable. He wants it more than anything.

He just doesn't want to ask him. And it gets harder as the year goes on and people start doing all their ridiculous promposals and he just can't. Nico asks him, once, if he plans on going with a date or just with Nate again.

Mikey can't look at him, just shrugs and says he doubts he'll even go this year.

Nate tells him he's being fucking stupid. He insists Nico would say yes if he asked, and also that his pouting is getting annoying, but that part's irrelevant.

Nico starts holding his hand sometimes, just because he can, and it makes Mikey feel like he's walking on air every single time.

He starts to gather the courage to ask him, thanks to that. He doesn't, though, because it's still pretty terrifying in a way that people have never been for him, but it's a near thing sometimes. Like that time he was helping Nico with his math - helping is a strong word for giving him the test he'd taken on that topic last year, but whatever - and they were on the couch, Nico almost in his lap. It was a lot all at once, and he was right there so he could do it. Just simply say "go to prom with me?" or something equally as simple.

He doesn't.

It's two days later he hears it doesn't matter, anyway.

He'd forgotten about the school's 'your grade only' rule with dances.

Mikey decides then that he's most definitely not going to prom, anyway.

Nate and Dylan try their best to get him to go, and they get close to it sometimes, but in the end he can't really imagine him having fun when all he'd be thinking about is how much he wanted to spend that night with Nico. So he doesn't budge. He'd, once again, gotten his own damn hopes up and had to deal with the aftermath himself.

The only thing worse than prom, he discovers, is watching all of your friends get ready and take pictures, and then scrolling through Instagram to look at all those pictures while they're out having fun. He wouldn't be having fun at prom, and he isn't having fun at home.

His only friend that isn't there is consequently the only person he'd wanted to spend time with that night anyway, so really it's a mystery as to why he isn't.

He calls Nico, who picks up on the second ring.

"Nics I'm  _ bored _ ."

He laughs, and Mikey hates how much he loves the sound.

"Missing out?"

"Prom is overrated," he says simply, because it is.

"Bored, then."

"Yeah, definitely."   
  


There's a stretch of silence from the other end, and it's ended when Nico finally says, "we could have our own prom."

"What?"

"Our own prom!"

His excitement is contagious, like always, and Mikey can picture the wide smile on his face, and it makes his heart melt just thinking about it. God, he is so royally screwed. So, despite not knowing what the fuck Nico is even talking about, he agrees.

"Yeah, let's do it."

Having their own prom, it turns out, is a whole affair. The game plan goes like this - wear the suits they would have worn to prom, go to a cheap chain Italian restaurant, and figure it out from there. It's basically just hanging out, but in suits. It isn't the worst concept in the world.

They keep talking on the phone as they get ready, and Mikey figures, hell, if they're having their own prom, he wants to be self-indulgent and have some factors of actual prom if he can.

"What colour tie are you wearing?"

"Red?"

"Okay," he nods to himself and picks out his own red tie.

Mikey picks him up, and they look ridiculous. As a pair, that is, given where they're going to be spending their evening, and Nico most definitely does not look ridiculous. He looks good, like,  _ really _ good. Mikey's chest aches because he can't just have this. But he's going to take what he can get, so it's fine, really.

The hostess looks like she really could not care less that they're dressed like that, as though it was a typical thing.

"We're a little overdressed," Nico laughs when they get to their booth.

"Maybe," he shrugs, and decides that maybe it's time he try to actually be a little bolder about all the shit that's been going on. The feelings and everything. "But you look fucking good, so who cares."

That's far from the smoothest he's ever been, but it's honest, at least. And, an added bonus, it makes Nico's cheeks turn pink, and that's definitely one of the greatest things he's ever seen.

"So do you."

Nico gets a grilled chicken salad, and Mikey gets spaghetti with alfredo sauce - Nico makes fun of him for putting alfredo on spaghetti, but he stands by it, thank you very much.

They just chat idly until their food arrives, and Nico isn't looking at him when he hooks their ankles together under the table. Maybe Nate was onto something, after all.

The rest of the meal goes on like that, mostly. Everything is normal except for where it isn't. The conversation is as easy as ever, but they've eaten off of each other's plates more times than Mikey would care to count, and Nico wipes sauce off of Mikey's face when a noodle falls off his fork, and it's new but familiar in a way he couldn't describe.

It's just. Good.

It’s also over way too soon. Mikey pays for the both of them after insisting it’s  _ his _ prom, so it’s  _ his _ responsibility to pick up the check.

They go back out to Mikey’s car and just sit in the parking lot for a little bit, because Mikey really doesn’t want the night to end, but there’s nowhere else to go. Nico doesn’t say anything, just takes his hand and looks out the window, so he thinks maybe the sentiment is shared. He’s a little worried they’re going to get in trouble for loitering or something when Nico squeezes his hand and finally looks over at him.

“Jesper told me how to get on the roof of the school.”

“Why does he know how to do that.”

Nico shrugs and just looks back out the window.

Mikey’s driving to the school before he really even knows why.

Actually getting on top of the roof is a much more complicated process than he would have thought it would be, but it’s fun, and by the time they’re both up there, Nico is breathless with laughter and the stars are above them and it’s perfect. They sit by the edge, their legs dangling off the side, hands folded together between them.

“You didn’t want to come up here to push me off, did you?”

“Obviously,” Nico rolls his eyes.

They’re quiet after that, and Nico’s looking at the sky and Mikey is looking at Nico, and it’s just getting a little bit hard to keep all his shit on lockdown around him anymore.

“I didn’t go to prom because I didn’t want to go without you,” he says without necessarily meaning to. He doesn’t regret it, though.

“I would have been okay by myself for today,” Nico smiles at him, and it’s not his usual wide grin. It’s small, and soft, and Mikey has only seen it a couple of times, but it’s probably his favourite.

“That’s not what I meant.”

“It’s not?”

“I,” he takes a deep breath, and it must be something in the quiet of the night that gives him the courage to continue, “I wanted you to go with me, like, as my date, I guess.”

“You guess?”

“Yeah.”

"Oh," Nico says and looks back up at the sky, and Mikey doesn't know how to take that at all. His heart feels like it might just actually pound its way out of his chest, and he didn't really even necessarily say anything completely incriminating. He could probably play this off as a joke if he really needed to, as much as that would suck.

He opens his mouth to do just that, but Nico points up at the stars. "You missed it."

"What?"

"Shooting star."

"Bullshit," he laughs, "it's too bright here to see a shooting star."

"No it's not," Nico shakes his head and looks over at him again, "I saw one."

"I don't believe you."

"Okay," he shrugs.

"Let's say you  _ did _ see a shooting star-"

"I did."

"What'd you wish for?"

Nico's smiling that little smile again, and god if he isn't gone on this boy. "That you'd dance with me."

A laugh bubbles out of Mikey, and he nods. "This  _ is _ our prom."

"Exactly."

"There’s no music, though."

Nico pulls his phone out of his pocket and waves it around. "That's easy."

It isn't what he'd been imagining for months, dancing with Nico. He'd pictured a cliche song and fancy lights and a hardwood floor and hundreds of students around them, probably bumping into them every other step or so, the too strong smell of too many different colognes and perfumes making him nauseous. 

He got the cliche song, Nico having put on whatever Ed Sheeran song that came up first - they all blend together in his mind. But instead of lights and hardwood and students, instead of all of that, he gets this. He gets the roof of the school under their feet, and the stars above their heads, and they're alone and Nico's chin is on his shoulder and he smells really good, and it's everything he could have ever wanted.

The song ends, and they don't separate, just stop moving.

"I'd have said yes," Nico whispers, and it's so close to his ear that Mikey almost shivers.

"What?" he asks, equally as quietly.

"If you asked me to prom."

"Oh," Mikey says this time.

"I'd like to kiss you now," he mumbles but doesn't move, and Mikey nods too fast.

Nico moves back just far enough to look at him, and they just stare at each other for a moment, and it feels like an eternity before they actually lean in, and then everything is Nico. The only thing in Mikey’s entire world is his friend, his arms around his shoulders and his lips on his, and it’s probably the best feeling in the world, he decides.

Nico pulls back and rests their foreheads together, letting out a little laugh.

“What?”

“Nothing. Wanted to do that for a while.”

“Really?”

“A year maybe.”

It’s Mikey’s turn to laugh, now. “I can’t believe Nate was right.”

“Let’s not tell him that,” Nico says, and his smile is the blinding one, the one he’d had the day they’d met. Mikey doesn’t know what’s brighter, that or the moon, and he could probably wax poetic about it for hours if he wanted to - but who has the time? He just kisses him again instead, because that’s basically the same thing, in the end.

**Author's Note:**

> why do I only write rarepairs
> 
> anyway, thanks for reading and I really hope you liked it!
> 
> catch me on [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/alcoholnregret) and [tumblr](http://sidnate.tumblr.com)


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